Shawn Floyd Soares was 39 years old when he died on Sunday, February 13, 2005, in downtown Los Angeles. According to the Los Angeles County Medical Examiner-Coroner, he died of stab wounds at 1330 S. Olive St. His death was ruled a homicide, and it is listed as a Los Angeles Police Department case handled by the Central Division.
The Los Angeles Times Homicide Report described him as "a 39-year-old white male" who "died Sunday, Feb. 13, after being stabbed in Downtown." That short entry is nearly all that has been made public about his death.
Beyond his name, his age and the place where he died, almost nothing about Shawn Floyd Soares has been made public. No obituary, memorial page or family fundraiser could be found for this story, and no news outlet appears to have reported on the death.
He surely had family, friends or neighbors who remember who he was, but none of that has entered the public record.
Because so little has been released, even the basic circumstances remain unknown to the public. The record does not say whether he was stabbed during a fight or a robbery, attacked by a stranger or by someone he knew, or hurt indoors or on the street. It does not say what time of day he was hurt, whether he died at the scene or later at a hospital, whether anyone saw what happened, or whether investigators ever identified a suspect.
Searches for his name are dominated by another Shawn Soares, a 26-year-old Virginia Commonwealth University student and former congressional staffer who was struck and killed by a car in Richmond, Virginia, in 2023, and who was remembered at vigils and in the Congressional Record. That young man has no connection to the man who died in Los Angeles nearly two decades earlier. A civil case filed in Florida by a man named Shawn Soares also appears to be unrelated.
Downtown Los Angeles is the center of city and county government and home to the city's tallest office towers, but its southern blocks have long had a different character. South Olive Street runs through an area of older commercial buildings, garment and wholesale businesses, parking lots and apartment buildings, not far from the convention center and the arena that opened in 1999. In 2005, parts of downtown were beginning to see new residents move into converted lofts, while other blocks remained quiet at night and on weekends. A stabbing on a Sunday in that part of downtown may have happened when the streets were less crowded than on a working day, though the record does not give the time.
Los Angeles still recorded roughly 480 to 520 homicides a year in the mid-2000s, and many of those killings were never solved.
No arrest, criminal charge or court case connected to the death of Shawn Floyd Soares could be found in news archives or public records. More than 20 years later, there is no public sign that anyone has been held responsible. Anyone who knew Shawn Soares, or who lived, worked or spent time on or near South Olive Street in downtown Los Angeles in February 2005, may hold information that could help investigators. A relative, a friend or a coworker who remembers him could also help fill in the story of who he was. Even a small detail, such as a name overheard, a vehicle seen nearby or a conversation remembered, can help detectives move a case forward. Anyone with information can call the Los Angeles Police Department at 877-527-3247 (877-LAPD-24-7), or leave an anonymous tip with Crime Stoppers at 800-222-TIPS (8477).
